If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

I am a single parent (father of 3) so went on benefits, when I started working 25h/week I was >£100/week worse off so didn't bother.
Now Im working full time and and get a good rate per hour im far better off

The system is messed up, if your on a low wage your better off financially not working, it doesn't exactly motivate people to work.

I am a single parent (father of 3) so went on benefits, when I started working 25h/week I was >£100/week worse off so didn't bother.
Now Im working full time and and get a good rate per hour im far better off

The system is messed up, if your on a low wage your better off financially not working, it doesn't exactly motivate people to work.

The US system is somewhat different. A family of 4 can make around 35k USD and qualify for $500+ a month in food stamps as well as $5,000 a year earned income credit paid in cash.

America is rapidly becoming a nation of takers. An increasing number of Americans expect the government to take care of them from the cradle to the grave, and they expect the government to dig into the pockets of others in order to pay for it all. This philosophy can be very seductive, but what happens when the number of takers eventually outnumbers the number of producers? In 11 different U.S. states, the number of government dependents exceeds the number of private sector workers. This list of states includes some of the biggest states in the country: California, New York, Illinois, Ohio, Maine, Kentucky, South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, New Mexico and Hawaii. It is interesting to note that seven of those states were won by Barack Obama on election night. In California, there are 139 "takers" for every 100 private sector workers. That is crazy! The American people have become absolutely addicted to government money, and it gets worse with each passing year. If you can believe it, entitlements accounted for 62 percent of all federal spending in fiscal year 2012. It would be one thing if we could afford all of this spending, but unfortunately we simply cannot. We are drowning in debt, and we are stealing more than a hundred million more dollars from future generations with each passing hour. No bank robber in history can match that kind of theft. Yes, we will always need a safety net. There are many people out there that simply cannot take care of themselves. We certainly don't want to see anyone sleeping in the streets or starving to death.
But if the number of people jumping on to the safety net continues to grow at the current pace, the net will break and it will not be available for any of us.
For example, the number of Americans on food stamps grew from about 17 million in 2000 to more than 47 million today. It nearly tripled in just 12 years.
What will happen if it nearly triples again over the next 12 years?
The federal government even has a website (benefits.gov) that guides people through the process of figuring out what welfare programs they can take advantage of.
Overall, the federal government runs nearly 80 different "means-tested welfare programs" and more than 100 million Americans are already enrolled in at least one of those programs.
Yes, I realize that figure is very hard to believe. I had a hard time believing it when I first came across it.
And it is even more shocking when you realize that the figure of 100 million Americans does not even include those who only receive Social Security or Medicare.
Today, there are 56.76 million Americans on Social Security.
To support all of those Americans on Social Security, there are only about 94.75 million full-time private sector workers.
So there are just 1.67 full-time private sector workers to support each American that is on Social Security.
Medicare is also growing like crazy. As I wrote about the other day, the number of Americans on Medicare is expected to grow from 50.7 million in 2012 to 73.2 million in 2025.
How much farther can we push things before the entire system collapses?

I love how the freaking right wingers (as bad as those left wingers) demonize those on social security!
Everyone getting a benefit each month (excepting ssd) PAID into the freaking system!

Now, with that said....
My social security is, thanks to REPUBLICANS with a lot of help from DEMOCRATS, a lot lower than it should be simply because I worked and retired from the postal service.
It is called the pension offset screw you people act.

I know several people who are on Social Security Disability. It would appear that all of them are faking a disability because it has become so easy to get on the program since Obama took office. I know a guy who got on it because he was depressed "at one time in his life." He was not being treated for depression when he got on the program. He said that he joked with his doctor about getting on disability, his doctor filled out the paperwork, and he was on the program.

There were 10,614,398 people enrolled in the program as of the end of 2011. 5.4 million people got on the program since Obama took office.

The last that I heard is that the payout is around $1,200 per month, but that is tax-free money. A recipient can also earn up to $1,000 per month of other income, net of expenses, and not have their payments reduced.

I suspect that a large percentage of the people who have been removed from the unemployment equation because they are no longer seeking work have found easy income with the Social Security Disability Insurance program.

I think I feel an illness coming on.

"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." -- Benjamin Franklin

I love how the freaking right wingers (as bad as those left wingers) demonize those on social security!
Everyone getting a benefit each month (excepting ssd) PAID into the freaking system!

Now, with that said....
My social security is, thanks to REPUBLICANS with a lot of help from DEMOCRATS, a lot lower than it should be simply because I worked and retired from the postal service.
It is called the pension offset screw you people act.

Social Security is going broke through no fault of your own. The Federal Government is currently spending $100 billion a year more than than receive in payroll tax.

This is why it doesn't make any sense to have a temporary 2% reduction in the payroll tax. Even more crazy the 2% reduction was supposed to be temporary and Obama is trying to keep the reduction after three years.

As TopDogger pointed out SSD is out of control. In the Appalachian mountains parents are refusing to have their children learn how to read. So that they can collect SSI benefits. When the child turns 18 they can then collect Social Security Disability for the rest of their lives.

Writing from Jackson, Kentucky, Mr. Kristof reported that numerous poor parents in Appalachian hill country are yanking their kids out of literacy classes in order to bag a $689 monthly Supplemental Security Income (S.S.I.) check per kid. The checks continue until the child reaches 18 years of age.

nearly two-thirds of these children make the transition at age 18 into S.S.I. for the adult disabled.

If my theory is correct, Obama is using easy access to the SSD program to pay people to remove themselves from the workforce, which artificially lowers the unemployment rate. People on SSD are "no longer seeking work" and therefore are removed from the unemployment calculation.

"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." -- Benjamin Franklin

Not theory, fact. It has been one spot where he and his regime have fudged the employment figures.

Now, for 2012....
In 2012 Social Security Was $47.8 Billion In The Red.....
The Social Security program ran a $47.8 billion deficit in fiscal 2012 as the program brought in $725.429 billion in cash and paid $773.247 for benefits and overhead expenses, according to official data published by Social Security Administration.http://lonelyconservative.com/2012/1...on-in-the-red/

Now for 2012 and the 2% reduction? That is not the problem!
As things turned out, we now have a modest shortfall. Why? One reason is the reduction in the payroll tax instituted in 2011 to fight the recession. But to date the sums involved in that tax holiday have not been substantial. The primary reason for the shortfall is that the median American wage, by contrast to productivity, has effectively stagnated since the mid-1970s. Since the so-called "Social Security Trust Fund" is financed out of a tax on wages (as of 2012, wages up to a maximum of $110,100 are subject to tax), and because the wages of most working Americans have largely stagnated for close to three decades, revenue growth has underperformed the expectations of the early 1980s. So, for example, when the minimum wage was raised in 1996, the projected date for the depletion of the "Trust Fund" was moved back by almost four years. Raise wages, and the revenues that can be anticipated from a tax on those wages will also rise. The issue is as simple as that. It is also as complex, as neither major party has taken the problem of wage stagnation seriously.Robert E. Prasch: Social Security: What Is At Stake? Why Now?

The above can be fixed if only the idiots in congress had the balls to raise the minimum wage to at least $10 per hour.
And no, this will not kill businesses, or cut back on hiring, etc.
For proof just see what raising the minimum wage has done to San Francisco and other cities who have done so already.

I know several people who are on Social Security Disability. It would appear that all of them are faking a disability because it has become so easy to get on the program since Obama took office. I know a guy who got on it because he was depressed "at one time in his life." He was not being treated for depression when he got on the program. He said that he joked with his doctor about getting on disability, his doctor filled out the paperwork, and he was on the program.

There were 10,614,398 people enrolled in the program as of the end of 2011. 5.4 million people got on the program since Obama took office.

The last that I heard is that the payout is around $1,200 per month, but that is tax-free money. A recipient can also earn up to $1,000 per month of other income, net of expenses, and not have their payments reduced.

I suspect that a large percentage of the people who have been removed from the unemployment equation because they are no longer seeking work have found easy income with the Social Security Disability Insurance program.